Heartbreaking and Poetic
by MissDizzyD
Summary: "I've... Got an exhibition." Derek said casually, like it wasn't a huge deal that Derek can not only draw really well, but drew his entire family and put them in an exhibition without the pack having the slightest clue what was going on.


**Heartbreaking and Poetic**

"Isaac?!" Stiles exclaimed upon opening his door. It wasn't the fact that Isaac was on his doorstep unannounced that shocked him; it was three weeks into the summer holidays and the pack had a habit of turning up at each others' houses without warning. It was the leaves in Isaac's knotted hair and the dirt on his shirt that concerned Stiles.

"Um, can I come in?" Isaac said, looking at his sneakers. Stiles stepped back from the doorway without a word and ushered the werewolf through to the kitchen.

"What happened?" He asked, setting two glasses of water on the table and sitting on the opposite side to Isaac, who wasn't meeting his eyes. "Isaac, are you okay?" Shit was going to go down if someone had hurt Isaac. If it was Jackson again, Stiles resolved to film him singing Britney Spears in the shower and post it on YouTube. That kid needed to learn how to play nicely.

"Derek," Isaac muttered reluctantly, looking at Stiles through his eyelashes and giving him the most adorable look. Stiles probably would've melted if it weren't for the anger bubbling in his gut because _Derek _was responsible for this? The Alpha would get it if he'd purposefully hurt Isaac, the puppy of the pack. No one hurts Isaac – it was an unspoken rule. "I went round to see him and he kicked me out. I don't know what happened, I didn't even go inside the house and he growled at me and told me to leave so I asked what I'd done and he dragged me down the stairs and shoved me away."

Stiles moved round the table and hugged Isaac, patting his hair and glaring at the wall like it was personally to blame for upsetting the beta.

"Do you want to use the shower? I have spare clothes?" Isaac stood up and nodded, moving towards the staircase, not needing directions. "Just look through my stuff until you find something the right size." Stiles said with a reassuring smile that dissolved into an angry grimace as soon as Isaac was safely upstairs. He reached into his pocket for his phone and rang Boyd. If anyone could figure out what was eating Derek, it was Boyd and Erica. With Boyd's calm reassurances and Erica's... imaginative threats, they would get to the bottom of this and hopefully ply some sort of apology out of Derek.

...

The doorbell rang. Stiles was tempted to ignore it in favour of watching the last twenty minutes of The Princess Bride with Isaac, now clean and leaf-free after his shower, but guilt got to him as it rang a second time, even more insistently.

Erica looked particularly pissed off, hair matted and dirty, her lipstick smudged and her knitted sweater frayed. Her eyes were glowing yellow and she was growling in the back of her throat as she stormed into the house, ignoring Stiles as she pushed past him. Boyd was looking a bit better, eyes their normal dark brown and no bits of foliage on his clothes. He clapped Stiles on the shoulder as he followed Erica through to the lounge, where she was already sulking next to Isaac, who actually looked a bit scared.

"Erica, could you not drop bits of tree on the couch please?" Stiles teased, holding his hands up in defeat when she bared her fangs at him. "Did he kick you out, too?"

"Literally." Erica snarled, twisting her pretty face into a sneer. Boyd took her hand and she visibly relaxed. "I asked him why looked so grumpy and he snapped at me, then kicked us off the porch."

"Sorry," Stiles sighed, rubbing his hand through his hair. He was actually pretty worried, an emotion Stiles never normally linked with Derek because Derek was... _Derek_. He was strong and handsome and someone who definitely didn't need worrying about but... Maybe he did. Maybe he always had. That was a scary thought on its own.

Erica and Isaac argued about whether to watch Labyrinth or Fight Club until Boyd wordless put Labyrinth in the DVD player and pressed play, stopping the argument and causing Erica to preen. Stiles rolled his eyes and went to the kitchen, spinning his phone in his hand and wondering if he should just go over to Derek's himself and see what was going on. Derek may act like he hates Stiles' guts but he wouldn't physically throw him out like he had with the wolves. Sometimes being the fragile human worked to his advantage.

Now he was thinking about it, he couldn't remember the last time he went to visit Derek at the old, charred house. It had always been at the loft apartment recently.

"Hey Boyd," he said as he walked back through to the living room and squished down into his dad's recliner, "When was the last time you actually went _inside_ the Hale House?"

"Before school finished," Boyd replied after a few seconds of consideration.

"What about you two?" Stiles asked, turning his eyes to Erica and Isaac who were wrestling on the rug. They stopped and looked up at him, both frowning as they tried to remember.

"About a month ago?" Isaac said, Erica nodding in agreement before leaning back in to bite his shoulder playfully.

That made up Stiles' mind. He stood up and zipped his hoodie all the way to the top, grabbing the keys to his Jeep off the coffee table. He told them where he was going and walked out before they could do more than stare wide-eyed, probably thinking he had a death wish. Maybe he did. He shrugged it off and hopped into his car, sending a quick text to Scott telling him where he'd gone, just in case.

...

Stiles drove through the town in silence, thinking hard about what his best tactic would be and how to minimise his chance of broken bones or a slashed throat. There was something in the Hale House that Derek didn't want his betas to see, of that much Stiles was sure because why else would he meet them on the porch and then refuse to let them in? Erica said he looked grumpy. That's nothing unusual but Derek never _reacted_ when they said it, he just scowled more than normal and walked away, pretending they never existed.

Once he reached the dirt road up to the House, he slowed down, putting off the moment where he'd actually confront Derek because that man could be seriously terrifying when he wanted to be. All too soon, though, he was pulling up and parking next to the Camaro in front of Derek's house.

Derek wasn't waiting for him on the porch like Stiles had expected. Nor was he watching creepily from one of the upstairs windows like he sometimes had previously. In fact, there weren't any signs of life at all, which was almost as off-putting as the window-staring.

"Derek?" He said quietly as he hopped out of the Jeep, closing the door gently behind him. "Are you here?" Still no response from the house. Well, if Derek wasn't there he may as well take a look around.

He climbed the porch steps and opened the front door. Nothing was different as far as he could see, it still smelt musty and faintly of smoke... Nothing had changed. Stiles had had images of a completely remodelled house that Derek didn't want anyone to see or a secret séance that the pack weren't allowed into or something. The fact that everything was exactly the same as the last time Stiles had been here was a bit depressing, not to mention disappointing.

"Hey, Derek?" Stiles walked further into the house and pushing open the door to the right of the staircase. That was the room where they used to hold pack meetings until Lydia got a bit pissed off when she leant against a wall and got her _("Latest season Prada, Derek!")_ blouse covered in black powder and insisted they move somewhere with a proper roof and four intact walls.

He moved through to the next room and gasped. He couldn't help it. He was faced with an easel holding a drawing of a beautiful woman with a strong jaw line and eyes that twinkled, even on canvas. Her wavy hair framed her face and even in the picture, Stiles could tell it wasn't blonde or light brown, but dark - almost black. He sighed again, realising why the cheekbones looked familiar and coming to a logical conclusion about who it was.

Laura.

"She was beautiful," Derek said, Stiles jumped and turned to look at him. Derek was standing less than two feet behind him and looking at the picture with big, sad eyes. "She had the smartest mouth I've ever known." He glanced at Stiles and gave him a sad, longing smile, "She could talk you into submission. I wish I could see that."

For once in his life, Stiles truly had no idea what to say. He could reassure Derek – tell him everything would be okay and things would get better... Empty words and lies that would not make either of them feel better – or he could say something outrageously flippant and make Derek want to kill him (although he'd have to get in line – Stiles would never forgive himself for joking about a family member's death).

"You don't have to say anything," Derek said, seeing Stiles' internal struggle. Stiles felt him step impossibly closer, pressing right up against his back and slowly slipping an arm around his waist, like he was waiting to be rejected, but hell if Stiles was going to throw this moment away. He had practically lived for the day when Derek would touch him like this – comforting and reassuring and gentle, more personal than pack. Intimate. "Is this okay?"

"Mhmm," Stiles said, not trusting himself with actual words. He let his head rest back against Derek's shoulder as they both looked at the picture. It really was exquisite.

"Thank you," Derek murmured a few minutes later, tickling Stiles' right ear with his lips.

"What for?" He whispered back.

"For being here, for understanding... For staying."

"I'd like to stay... If you want me to." He hoped desperately that Derek understood what he was saying – He wanted to _stay_. He wanted to be there for Derek, no matter what else was happening in their crazy town. He wanted to be _Derek's_, forever, if he was allowed.

"You... You actually want to be here, with me?"

"If you don't mind," Stiles said, so quietly that it was hardly there. He felt Derek's arms tense around him and he cursed himself. He'd ruined their moment. Derek didn't want _Stiles_, he just wanted someone – anyone – to be with him for that moment. Stiles only happened to turn up at the right moment. He was temporary pack-cuddle material, not long-term relationship material. He backtracked. "I mean, if you need me at anytime you know where I live, which, yeah, sounds weird now I say it out loud like that, but you know, if you ever need to talk to someone then I'm here and... Are you laughing at me?"

Derek was, indeed, laughing at him. Tiny huffs of breath tickled Stiles' neck where Derek was trying to smother them and he was actually smiling, a hint of teeth grazing Stiles' skin, making his knees go weak. Stiles tried to push away to minimise the amount of humiliation he would feel, but Derek's arms tightened and pulled him closer and... Oh. _Oh._

Derek kissed his neck, licking over the pulse as his heartbeat skyrocketed. He leant back against Derek's muscled chest and rolled his head to the side, feeling the vibrations as the Alpha growled happily against his throat. Stiles realised that in wolf terms, he'd practically opened his legs and shouted "CLAIM ME" but he couldn't bring himself to care. If this meant 'forever' then he'd take it.

"Derek..." Stiles groaned and his eyes slipped closed when Derek dragged his lips across Stiles' jaw, nipping and sucking as he went. This was about as close to perfection as Stiles had ever been and he didn't want it to stop. Only when Derek spoke again did he finally open his eyes to reality.

"I suppose you should meet the rest of the family."

...

"Where are we actually going, though?" Stiles asked when he couldn't stand the silence any more. They were hardly onto the main road.

"I've... Got an exhibition. In the next town over," Derek said casually, shifting gears like nothing happened, like it wasn't a huge deal that Derek can not only draw really well, but drew his entire family and put them in an exhibition without the pack having the slightest clue what was going on. "It opens in a week."

"Dude, really? You didn't tell the pack?"

"It's not a big deal."

"It really is," Stiles said, "It's a huge deal. I wouldn't have sent Erica and Boyd over if I knew what you were hiding from them."

"You sent Erica and Boyd? Isaac too?" Derek frowned as he turned a corner.

"No, Isaac was worried about you then I was worried about Isaac so I sent Erica and Boyd... And then I was worried about Erica, Boyd, Isaac _and_ you so I came to see you," He took a deep breath before muttering, "Figured you wouldn't kick me out, being the pathetic human I am."

"You're not pathetic." Derek said, reaching over and interlacing their fingers. Stiles watched, fascinated, as Derek kissed the back of his hand. How did they go from Stiles wondering if Derek would kill him to kisses and handholding in less than an hour? "We're here." Derek expertly pulled into a space in front of the building and slid from the car, the very epitome of grace. Stiles fumbled out and walked round the hood to stand next to him. "Ready?" Derek said, clenching his jaw and looking straight ahead.

"I don't have to..."

"No," Derek snapped, grabbing Stiles' hand again, "I want you to see it first." He took a key out and unlocked the door, flicking on the lights once they were inside.

The gallery was beautiful. The floor was made of dark, polished wood and the high ceilings were painted white, held up by pillars in a row down the centre. Ceiling and floor were joined by tall brick walls. The room was brightly lit by spotlights hanging from the ceiling that pointed in every direction, not highlighting certain works but complementing the room as a whole. It was a big gallery, Stiles thought, about 15 meters long but narrow and rectangular with only the back wall bare.

Yes, the gallery was almost ethereal in its beauty, but the pictures hung on those brick walls made it look dull in comparison.

"Start on this side," Derek placed his hand on the small of Stiles' back and guided him to the left hand side of the gallery. Stiles was struck by how realistic the portraits were, full of life somehow, the lines blending seamlessly to create light and shadow and texture. They were bigger than life-size by triple, drawn directly onto large canvasses with charcoal. Derek named each one as they passed, giving bits of trivia like birthdays and favourite colours and what relation they were to him. "Talia, my mother, she was the Alpha before Laura... Aunt Zara, Peter's wife, she made the best peanut butter cookies I've ever had... You know Peter, obviously...Dominic, my little cousin, he used to sing carols for us every year at Christmas..."

Stiles felt like crying every time he saw a new picture; it reminded him just how much Derek had lost to the fire and to Kate Argent, but he smiled through it and examined each picture closely, committing each name to memory and drinking in all the information that Derek would give.

"This side is specific places I remember..." Derek said, directing Stiles towards the first picture. It was the Hale House in all its pre-fire glory, standing proud and whole in the middle of the forest. This was Derek's home, how he knew it and it felt private. Like Stiles was getting a glimpse of Derek's memories. The rest of the pictures were mostly of places in Beacon Hills and the surrounding woods, the most impacting being of a wolf in the middle of a clearing, howling at the moon. The critics would call it fanciful and majestic but Stiles knew that this, like the other drawings, was straight from Derek's childhood, that the wolf in the picture was Derek's mother in her Alpha form, signalling to the rest of the pack to join her.

They reached the last picture and Stiles' breath caught in his throat. It was a collage of different images, still in charcoal, but more figurative than the rest of the candid portraits and landscapes. There were small drawings of symbols and objects connected by long, swirling branches and leaves. Right in the centre was a wolf, viewed from head-on, eyes shining and shaded in with red – the only splash of colour in the entire exhibition.

"It's the extended pack... We're all represented on there," Derek said. He pointed at a lacrosse helmet with two sticks crossed underneath – an alternative to skull and crossbones, "Jackson," he muttered, sounding annoyed and irritated but fond. Next he drew Stiles' attention to a Sheriff's badge, right next to a branch with a stethoscope. Obviously Stiles' dad and Melissa. That made Stiles smile – his dad was considered 'extended pack'. "This is you." He pointed at an exact replica of the bat symbol, on the immediate right of the wolf, typically where the second in command of a pack stands, according to the history books.

"I'm Batman?" He said, a stupid smile on his face.

"You've always been Batman. You were never Robin," Derek answered straight away, smiling into Stiles' neck again. "That's all of them." They stood by the door for a few more minutes, looking around the room.

"You must've spent a fortune on charcoal," Stiles said, one of the many random observations that his mind threw at him while they were walking around. Derek stiffened behind him, pulling away and dropping his arms to his sides. Stiles turned to look at him.

"I... My... The house..." Derek said, eyes looking haunted. Stiles' stomach swooped. He didn't need to hear anything more, he got it straight away – why this was so important to Derek and why no one had been allowed in the house and why he looked so disturbed and guilty about it. Derek had been drawing his dead family with sticks of charcoal from the house where they were burned alive.

"That would be poetic if it weren't so heartbreaking," Stiles said softly, stepping up and wrapping his arms around Derek's shoulders and pulling him into a hug.

"You'll come to the opening?" Derek said, one hand moving to rest on Stiles' hip, the other on his back pressing them together.

"Yeah, if you want me there."

...

The doorbell rang.

Stiles was getting pretty fucking tired of the sound of the doorbell. The pack had decided that his house was the best since his dad worked right through the afternoon and evening. Lack of parental supervision coupled with Stiles' talent for baking and the resulting plethora of snacks meant that the Stilinski house was the new pack HQ.

It was the day of the opening of Derek's exhibition. None of the pack knew about it because Derek didn't want to face the questions until the exhibition was open and running smoothly. Stiles respected that and so none of the pack knew about them being a 'thing' either. They'd deal with it afterwards. Lydia, though, had noticed something was wrong and demanded to know everything, then insisted Stiles invite her to the opening. So they were going together and Stiles would meet Derek there.

"Hey... Lydia..." He said, eyes widening as he saw the garment back hanging off her finger. "What's that?"

"Oh honey, it's a suit. You can't wear a superhero shirt tonight, this is a big event for Derek," She flicked her hair and lead Stiles back up to his room by his elbow. A few months ago (weeks, even) this was probably Stiles' number one fantasy, but now... Well, things were going well with Derek in a kind of quiet, slow way, but that was fine. Truth be told, Stiles hadn't seen much of him because he was working on the final piece of his exhibition almost non-stop.

"A suit?" Stiles replied absently as she unzipped the bag and showed him the jacket and trousers. He looked at what Lydia was wearing and shamelessly ogled for a moment. Her turquoise cocktail dress hugged her waist and hips and showcased her legs flawlessly. Stiles felt sorry for any poor, unsuspecting men they encountered tonight. She distracted him by throwing a crisp white shirt at him.

"Yes. A suit. Classic black. Even you can't mess this up."

"I resent that comment," Stiles said, pulling off the Henley he had thrown on after his shower and slipping on the shirt. It fit him perfectly. "Where did you get this?"

"I had it tailored. The manager owed me a favour. Don't drip anything down it," Lydia said, swatting his hand away from the top buttons, "Only up to here," she pointed at a button halfway down Stiles' chest, pulling it open so his collarbones were on show. "Perfect."

"'Perfect' seems to be a matter of opinion," he muttered, plucking nervously at the hem of the shirt.

"Sweetie," Lydia said condescendingly, grabbing his hand and looking him straight in the eye, "If I say you look perfect then you look perfect." She started tugging at his hair where he'd grown it out, pulling the strands until they stuck up at the front. "Okay?"

"Okay."

"Good. Put your trousers on."

...

After claiming that sitting in the rusty Jeep would probably give her tetanus, Lydia was driving her car with Stiles sat in the passenger seat almost buzzing out of his skin with nerves and anxiety. He was nervous for Derek – after all this was his debut into the art world and no one knew if his exhibition would go down well. Derek said he didn't care, that he was only doing it for himself, but it still stressed Stiles out.

They ended up parking a couple of streets away because the place was completely packed out and Lydia had to physically hold Stiles back to prevent him from running ahead. She linked her arm through his and whispered threats that they both knew she would carry out if he made her walk in alone. He held the door open, like a gentleman, and walked inside after her. They accepted leaflets from the woman at the door and started looking around.

"Stiles," Lydia gasped, staring down the length of the room, wide-eyed. He followed her gaze and stopped dead. There was an unexpected addition hung on the back wall, 6 feet square, with a huge crowd of people in front of it. "Stiles-"

Stiles had already set off down the gallery, striding purposefully towards the picture of himself hanging at the other end. A few people smiled at him and he tried his best to smile back but his face was still frozen from shock. He moved without thinking, putting one foot in front of the other automatically until he was stood right in front of the picture. It was drawn from charcoal, like all the others in the room and Stiles imagined Derek slaving away over this picture, using carefully cut sticks of wood from his burnt out childhood home. It definitely wasn't there the first time Stiles visited – he would have remembered. Derek had drawn this in a _week_?!

His eyes roamed over the picture, taking in his own cheeky grin and teasing eyes, his head turned to the right slightly. Every single mole on his face and neck was in the right place, dotted on his cheeks and down his throat, mapped with perfect precision. It hit Stiles hard that Derek wanted this representation to be perfect – it meant that Derek really _cared_. There was a small paragraph of writing in the bottom right hand corner above Derek's signature. Stiles leant in to read it:

_Our life together_

_Heartbreaking and poetic_

_Only just begun_

It read as a declaration and a promise and Stiles wanted it so much that his chest ached. He wanted a life with Derek and the pack, looking after any new pups, teasing Jackson for being a douche, making sure Erica was safe because that's what Batman should do, and loving and being loved by this crazy, brooding artist who first stomped into his life to accuse him of trespassing.

He didn't even jump when he felt the hand on his hip.

"What do you think?" Derek asked, entwining their fingers and kissing underneath Stiles' jaw.

"I, uh," Stiles cleared his throat and tried again, injecting some humour into his voice to mask the fact he was actually tearing up, "Technique is beautiful, subject matter less so..."

"Really?" Derek said sardonically, "I quite like the subject matter."

"I can tell..."

"If I kiss you now," Derek whispered right next to ear, "It will be in the paper tomorrow. Can I kiss you?"

"Are you kidding?" Stiles said, turning in Derek's arms to face him. He took Derek's hand off his hip and pressed it against his chest, holding it there with one of his own hands. "I want everyone to see I'm yours." Derek must have felt the truth ringing in the words and heard all the connotations of the simple statement, because he ducked his head and pressed their lips together.

...

"Well," the Sheriff said the next morning. The pack were assembled for brunch at the Stilinski house again, with Stiles cooking endless amounts of bacon at the stove while everyone else sat around the table in varying states of wakefulness. "When were you going to tell me about this, son?" He dropped a newspaper on the countertop next to Stiles' elbow. The front page was filled with a photo of Derek's drawing of Stiles, an inset in the corner showing the two of them kissing.

Stiles picked it up, blushing beet red. The wolves in the room turned to look at what had got Stiles' heart racing like a jackhammer so early on a Sunday morning. Derek merely glanced over, saw what Stiles was holding and smirked smugly into his coffee.

"Me and Derek are... a thing?" He said hesitantly. Scott's head shot up off the table and he stared open mouthed at Stiles, who studiously ignored it and ploughed on, "We, uh, only got together properly last night. We're going out for dinner today, though, and Derek was going to ask your permission then." He ad-libbed the last part, hoping Derek was smart enough to go with it. Apparently he was because he nodded and took another sip of coffee, absentmindedly nudging Jackson's feet off the table – he knew how much the scuff marks annoyed Stiles.

"You're happy, son?" The Sheriff said, lowering his voice so, in theory, only Stiles could hear him. Stiles wondered if he'd actually forgotten about werewolf super-hearing or if he was purposefully asking in front of Derek.

"Yes."

"Well then," his dad said after a short pause, "Derek, I think you should know that I've been in law enforcement for over thirty years and I've learnt some tricks along the way," He turned his glare back onto Derek, who shrank back slightly. "You hurt my son and I will make sure the pieces of your body are so small that the worms won't have to chew, okay?"

"Yes, Sir," Derek said, looking particularly pale.

"Hey Derek?" Erica said from her spot next to Boyd, "You hurt my Batman and I'll get out the banana slicer my mum thought would make a good birthday present. You get my drift?" She finished with a wink and a feral grin. Stiles felt a little bit awkward discussing the mutilation of Derek's junk at the dining table, so he hastily slid the next bowl of bacon onto the table, patting Derek's shoulder as he passed.

"Don't worry. If you hurt me I'll make sure they never find your body to disfigure it." He laughed at Derek's stricken expression and kissed his cheek. PDAs were officially on the table now that their pack knew about them.

Derek pulled him back by the hand, which he then placed over his heart. It beat steadily under Stiles' fingers.

"I will never hurt you."

The beat stayed regular.


End file.
